Happy Pi Day!

Because today is March 14 (i.e. 3.14), my advisees and I celebrated Pi Day by having a huge pie-fest in my apartment.  Last month I hosted an advisee birthday party because between the last week of January and the second week of February, nearly half of my advisees were celebrating a birthday.  Sadly, I accidentally erased all of those photos before downloading them to my computer :-(.

Not to worry, I knew I'd be able to snap a few more photos on Pi Day!  So three of my advisees were in charge of bringing Pi Day to life.  After school, they walked up to my apartment and, from scratched produced a cheesecake (okay, not technically a pie I guess but made in a pie pan) and another "cookie" pie that were out of this world!  Furthermore, two of them brought two apple pies they had made the night before.  Throw in 7 more advisees as guests, some milk and coke (their idea, not mine), a deck of cards and some music (of course, don't forget the yummy pies), and voila, it's a Pi Day party!

In the picture above, are my three pie bakers!  From left to right we have Jacqui (Massachusetts), Momo (Hawaii) and Tatiana (California) holding their prized cheesecake with the "Pi" symbol in the center.  Well done, ladies!  In the picture to the right we have 10 of my 13 advisees waiting with anticipation for the cheesecake to cool.  From left to right we have Momo, Tatiana, Jacqui, Corynne (NJ), Victoria (CA), Nico (DC), Rhyan (NH), Rachel (CT), Albert (PA), and Nick (CA).  Not pictured are Reggie (CA), Akbar (CT) and Roman (CA).

This last picture isn't showing a pie either, nor was it made on Pi Day.  But in the spirit of it being circular and the fact that it's a Unit Circle cake (with Nutella frosting, made by one of my honors precal/trig students), I thought I'd include this one as well.  Actually Emma (VA) was the student and she got me in our Secret Santa Gift Exchange.  This was my gift!  Cute, mathy and quite creative, don't you think?

The Doors of Viterbo

When Mike was here back in the fall, we were walking around a neighborhood called San Pellegrino and snapped a bunch of residential doors.  It made me think of the iconic "Doors of Ireland" I recall seeing a few decades back and got me thinking about making a "Doors of Viterbo."  So here's finished product of that idea. Enjoy!

Ash Wednesday (March 5)

When I was a study-abroad student in Granada, Spain 25 years ago (wow!) I remember how cool it was to celebrate Lent and Easter in a different country.  La Semana Santa (Holy Week) in Granada was a series of processions honoring many saints, the apostles and, of course, Jesus.  How the community rallied around these processions was quite amazing!

Two days ago, I got a little glimpse of a tradition at one of the churches in Viterbo, Santa Maria di Verita (Saint Mary of the Truth) that, in all of the Ash Wednesdays back in the States I've gone to never have I seen The Burning of the Palms.

In the picture you see the congregation filing in with their saved palms from Palm Sunday 2013.  Yvonne, my Italian buddy, who went with me to mass, told me that the brittled palms symbolize that while we want to be close to the Lord, we sometimes fall short through our sins (we are human after all!).  By bringing the palms to Ash Wednesday of the next year and adding them to the cauldrons to be burned, it is an offering to God in hope He will forgive our sins.  Burning the palms down to ashes also is hope that over the coming 40 days of Lent and the coming year we will make sacrifices in our lives and refrain from sin in an effort to be drawn closer to God.

I'd never heard Ash Wednesday put quite that way but it certainly makes sense.  As you can see in the picture, the small cauldrons of dried palms lit up like a match box in a church that dates back to the 12th century.  Don't worry, the church ceiling was (and still is) plenty high!  Once the cauldrons were lit after a short prayer, they were put outside the church doors as mass proceeded!  Happy Lent Everyone!

                             "In life, that which you do not need weighs you down"

                                                       ~ Mother Theresa ~

Palermo (February 25)

After another great sleep, a cappuccino and a chocolate corneto (basically a croissant filled with chocolate), we decended from the hill of which our hotel was perched on the road that lead us into the center of the city.

Palermo is not only the capitol of Sicily, it also is the largest city on the island, about 800,000 residents.  Today we were lead by Virginia (pictured left), another very knowledgeable and energetic guide.  I wouldn't say she was our best since she spoke pretty fast and was a little too technical and minute in detail of the information she provided.  I think if she had slowed down a bit and stayed a little more toward the basics of our sites, she would have had a more captive audience.  Listen to me....I've become a tourist guide critic all of a sudden!

Our first stop landed us in front of two churches, right next to one another.  The on the right was called La Chiesa di Santa Maria dell'Ammiraglio.  Ammiraglio means "admiral", which originates from George Antioch, the principle admiral and prime minister under King Roger II in the 12th century.  While the altar is certainly done in Baroque style, the interior has plenty of Byzantine and Islamic influence in its brilliant mosaics as well as its frescos, which were painted during the Renaissance period.  The second church, San Cataldo, a much smaller church, also was founded in the 12th century and there are many examples, both inside and out, of Arabic and Norman influence on its design.  It was actually converted into a post office during the 18th century but restored back to its original use and interior design in the 19th century.

Our next stop was La Fontana Pretoria in the piazza by the same name.  The fountain was originally commissioned for Florence but ultimately, the bid went to Palermo in the 16th century.  By the 18th century, people associated the fountain and its square, with its numerous nude statues, with the corruption of the government and municipalities of Palermo, and thus nicknamed it the "Square of Shame."

This piazza led us to our next church, La Chiesa del Gesu, The Church of Jesus Christ.  The Jesuits landed in Palermo in 1549 and by the early 17th century had erected and dedicated this church.  Like La Chiesa di Santa Maria dell'Ammiraglio, the interior is heavily decorated in the Baroque style, as evidence by its ornate beauty including marble carvings, frescos, and stained glass windows.  Unfortunately, much of the dome and the surrounding walls were destroyed during an WWII air raid in 1943.  The church was eventually restored and rededicated in 2009.

Next on our tour was the Palentine Chapel.  As you can see, the exterior does not even look chapel-like.  That is because the chapel is housed within this municipal building.  So to say I was underwhelmed when I first walked through the front door the building would be an understatement.  The chapel actually is located on the second floor of the building and looks into a courtyard you cannot see from the street.  Once I entered the chapel I was blown away!

Every nook and cranny of this chapel was ornately represented in some way.  And like La Chiesa di Santa Maria dell'Ammiraglio, it too had Arab influences throughout.  As our guide told us, "the Romanesque style churches tried to tell a story with the art they placed within a church, usually gospel stories depicting the life of Jesus."  However, the Arab/Islamic style churches during the Byzantine era was more interested in blowing people away with its often brilliant golden mosaic geometric designs.  They weren't as interested in whether or not their decor told a story.

This 12th century chapel was built during the reign of Roger II and dedicated to Saint Peter.  In this picture (facing the back of the chapel) we see Jesus sitting on a thrown, as a king would, with Saint Peter on his left and Saint Paul on his right.  The detail of the mosaics was unparalleled by any other church of its time.

However, my favorite part of this chapel was the ceiling.  looking straight up, from one end to the other is an intricate set of wooden pieces interlocked together to make this three-dimensional honeycomb-like design.  It took years for the ceiling alone to be completed and you can see why.  Truly remarkable!

Afterwards, it was time to get a little lunch from all of the site-seeing.  Pat insisted that Brad, Richard, and I try what is called a panella sandwich, which consists of a fried chickpea pancake with fried mashed potato balls smooshed on top of the pancakes, all inside of a roll.  And if that wasn't enough, Danielle talked me into getting an aranccina, which is a big ball of fried rice, prosciutto and cheese.  It was a high caloric, high carbohydrate heart attack lunch!  It was all good but nevertheless done...checked off my bucket list!

Now off to our last site of the day, La Zisa!  Zisa is a castle that was originally constructed for King William I of Sicily in the mid-12th century but wasn't completed until the reign of William II in the late 12th century.  It was a very opulent (Arab-designed) castle as you can imagine, with all of the amenities of the day including an intricate way of circulating air through the castle via pools, fountains, and niches between floors throughout the castle to keep it cool in the summer months.

 Here's a photo of what once used to be a large pool with a fountain in the middle (now inhabited by grass and weeds), that contributed to the ancient "air conditioning" system of Zisa.

Over the years, this castle became run down and was nearly destroyed in the early 1970s by a lightening storm.  It was only then that the government decided to step in and try and salvage it, which they did by reconstructing the castle with new brick and mortar and infusing it with the remains of the original castle from the storm.

Lastly, here is a very ornate tombstone of the mother of a Grisanto priest found on the premesis.  Each panel is written in a different languages (Hebrew, Arabic, Greek and Latin), as many of the tombstones back then were.  The tombstone dates back to 1148.

Sciacca/Segesta (February 24)

Once again we loaded up the bus with our stuff after checking out of our hotel in Agrigenta and it was off to our next adventure in Segesta.  But first, we made a quick stop in Sciacca, another coastal city that appears to make most of their money in the summer.  It's very much a destination for northern Europeans according t the locals and you can see why.  The view of the Mediterranean Sea is amazing!

While in Sciacca, Brad was on the hunt for some fish.  We hadn't eaten any on the entire trip but we were all in the mood, with Brad leading the way.  It was 11:30 a.m. and we needed to be back on the bus by 12:30, not ideal lunch-eating hours in Italy by any stretch.  However, in talking to a Brooklynite-turned-Sicilian woman by virtue of marrying one 25 years ago, she pointed us in the right direction.  We found a little place not too far from the shoreline that was willing to seat us at 11:45 a.m.  Among the five of us sitting, we ordered octopus, sardines, muscles, and what looked like bass (but had an Italian name that now escapes me).  All fresh from that morning and so good.   The only problem was that we had to literally wolf it down in order to get back to the bus on time.  Still, it was very worth the potential indigestion we might have to experience from running up a very large hill to get to our bus.  Here's a picture of Brad savoring the moment before diving into his lunch!

Then it was off to Segesta!  Segesta is located in the Northwestern part of Sicily and was originally home to the Elymians, one of three groups of indigenous people to the province.  The two main attractions in Segesta are its Greek Theater and the Greek Temple.  The Theater is carved out of a hilltop that one can get to by a small bus, but he switchbacks were too sharp for our large bus.  And while the local bus was an option to us, we decided to hoof it up the hill, which was about a 20-25 minute hike and an ascension of about 500-800 feet.  Once we all caught our breath at the top we took in another amazing view of the land with the Gulf of Castellamare in the distance (see above left).

While up there, the students had yet another opportunity to display their acting talents by offering up scenes from the play Antigone, which was written around the time this theater would have been build, about 5th century BC.  Below is a scene where Polyneices, played by Pat Scanlon's son, Julian, is dead and his family is trying to take his body for a proper burial.  However Creon, played by Nick Polyzoides (i.e. guy with the active hands/arms), has the authority to stop the family from taking the body.  And again, what was once a tragedy quickly turned into a comedy.  I was thoroughly entertained but I don't think Mr. Davis, our Greek teacher, might not have found it as amusing.

Also situated at the top of the hill was an abandoned Islamic mosque.  The Muslims occupied Segesta during the Norman Period (12th century AD).  It wasn't took long after the mosque and necropolis were complete that Segesta was taken over by the Christians and it was, as a result, destroyed in the beginning of the 13th century.  For whatever reason, the city was abandoned by the Christians in the second half of the same century.

Then we entered the Greek Temple, also very well-preserved.  It also was built in the 5th century BC with columns measuring 56 meters high (about 183 feet).  Wow!  It is believed that the temple was never finished as evidenced by the lack of fluting on the pillars, a means of treating the pillars with vertical grooves, giving it more of a finished look.

After a long day, it was on to our third and final hotel of our stay in Sicily, the Bel 3 in the suburbs of Palermo.  While en route Danielle asked Niccolo, our bus driver, to pull over on the side of road where there stood a spire commemorating the death of Giovanni Falcone.  Falcone was one of the first judges in Italy willing to take on the Italian mafia in the mid 1980s, known as the Maxi Trial.  Upon sentences being upheld (brought down by Falcone) the top of the mafia food chain ordered a hit on Falcone.  On May 25, 1992, Giovanni Falcone was assassinated by a detonated bomb explosion under the freeway connecting Polermo's airport with the city.  Falcone's wife and three police officers escorting them were among the others who perished in the blast.

Agrigento (February 23)

Agrigento is situated on the southern most tip of Sicily and is home to the Valley of the Temples.  It is one of the main tourist attractions in all of Sicily because of how well the Greek temples are preserved, even better than the Parthenon or the Acropolis in Greece.  Why the term "valley" is used to describe the location of these temples is quite misleading, as the temples are situated on a mountain ridge with incredible views of the sea below.

The Valley of Temples includes seven different temples of Greek mythology, however we only had time to see three of them.  The first was the temple of Harrah (see left), a reluctant wife of Zeus.  It was constructed in the 5th century BC.  While there, several of the kids acted out scenes from the book Oedipus Rex, including the scene where Oedipus discovers that the man he's killed is his father, Laius, and the woman that he is married to, for whom she bore his four children, is his mother, Jokasta.  They needed some extra actors so I reluctantly agreed to play Jokasta.  Needless to say, given my role in the story, this tragedy soon turned into a comedy!

Our next temple visited was the Temple of Concordia, probably the best preserved of all the temples.  As a result it is "ranked among the most notable edifices of the Greek civilization existing today," according to Wikipedia.  At one point in its history, the Temple of Concordia was turned into a church.  The sepulchers are still visible to this day and date back to the Middle Ages.

Lastly, was the Temple of Olympian Zeus, the largest and most sprawling of all the temples.  It is considered the largest temple in the western Greek world, right here in Sicily.  The blocks used to build the temple and its surrounding buildings are enormous.  Richard Davis, our Greek teacher, says that in order for the blocks to be lifted and put in there proper places, Agrigento called upon the largest and strongest men.  The blocks, made out of sandstone, had carved out niches in them that helped secure the rope for which the men used to move the blocks.  Pretty amazing when you see one of these massive blocks about 64 cubic feet each.  To put things in further perspective, the picture at the left shows a statue of a mythological figure, called an Atlas, which rested on top of each of the 3-4 dozen 40-foot pillars to carry some of the load the temple itself.  The statue pictured is one we saw in the neighboring museum prior to going to the Valley of the temples.

This tree doesn't have much to do with our trip but I had never seen one like it and found it interesting.

Piazza Armerina (February 22)

After checking out of our hotel in Taormina, we headed to Piazza Armerina for the morning and early afternoon to see the Castle of Villa Romana.  While there, two students were in charge of introducing the ruins of castle to the rest of the group. To date, nobody knows for sure who lived in this castle but it was certainly a well-to-do family, possibly an emperor, as is evidenced by the 30,000+ mosaic tiles throughout the various rooms inside the castle.  To the right is the floor plan of the castle illustrating the enormity of it.

After the intro, the student leaders engaged the group in a scavenger hunt, where they had to the answers to a series of questions by traversing through the castle.  For example, one of the questions asked about the different objects the female athletes in bikinis were holding and their significance.  Here’s a picture of the winning group. From left to right: Andrew, Quincy, Nick, Ben, and Aiden.

This photo depicts a woman in the center, possibly a matriarch of the family, with her two sons (on either side of her) with her two servants on either end.  As legend has it, the woman is one of the mistresses of the emperor, Maxium, of the castle.  The man to her right is one of her sons, Maxentius, who is allegedly cross-eyed and also believed to be the son of Maxium.  Interestingly enough, upon closer look, the man in the mosaic is definitely not cross-eyed but it has become the accepted way of accounting this story.  Why?  I do not know and nor do Yvonne or Santo, our SYA ancient art history and ancient history teachers.  Unless people come to see it for themselves, people will continue to believe the story in its current version.

As you can see, there are thousands of mosaic designs on each floor of the castle.  Here is a photo of a courtyard with a huge fountain.  It’s adjacent to the main (and very long) hallway (see left), probably a place where most of the entertaining occurred.  You can see in the picture of the long hallway that in order to preserve the mosaic floors, they needed to be covered from the natural elements.  So the missing ceilings and walls were reconstructed in a way to match the original shape and dimensions of the castle.

This next picture are of women who are in bikini-like garb.  However they are not planning on going to the beach for a suntan.  Instead these women are athletes wearing their stropium, which is the upper part of the uniform, and their subligar, the lower part.

No castle can be complete without its own bathhouse! You can see from the picture (left) that the owners wanted theirs to be one of great size and opulence, so that no matter how many guests were staying, they all could fit comfortably at one time if they so chose.  I cannot imagine why a castle full of people would feel the need to descend upon the bathhouse at one time but, as the famous line from the movie Amadeus would tell us, "well, there it is!"  

Modica (February 21)

After some lunch in Ragusa, we loaded the kids back on the bus and traveled to a neighboring town along the Iblea mountain range called Módica.  Francesca and Barbara followed us over there and continued with their thoughtful guidance through the town.  Like Ragusa, Módica also was flattened by the earthquake of 1693 and rebuilt thereafter in Baroque-style fashion.

Our first attraction was the duomo of Módica, called San Giorgio-Mater Ecclesiae.  It is situated at the top of the town which, like Ragusa, is carved out of the hills of mountains of Iblea.  So we had a bit of hike upwards from the bus to get there.  The church was closed but the one of the priests let us in for about 10 minutes to view the inside.  Again, the interior was gorgeous, especially the altar, comprised of 10 panels depicting scenes of the Holy Family from the birth of Jesus through to his ascension into Heaven.

Módica is also known for being the home of Salvatore Quasimodo, one of Italy’s four Nobel Prize winners for literature (1959).  The plaque is located just outside his childhood home. Quasimodo was a poet and wrote such works as "Day After Day", "Life is Not a Dream", and "The Incomparable Land," which have a satirical slant on the post World War II world.

 ciocolate perperoncino, a spicy chocolate.  While many of these original chocolate recipes did not survive in America, they thrived and were perfected in Sicily.  In fact, many Italians admit that Italy was not the inventors of much over the centuries.  “We take inventions and perfect them,” as many of the Viterbese folk I’ve spoken to declare proudly.

Módica

Módica is also known for its contributions to the making and spreading of the chocolate phenomenon over the centuries.  For a time, Sicily was under Spanish rule.  Often Spanish explorers would bring back material goods from the New World but they also would bring back recipes of foods they had experienced from the natives. One such recipe was

While in Módica, we were privy to experience the chocolate of Antica Dolceria Bonajuto, both a chocolate store and factory.  We enjoyed tasting different kinds of chocolate ranging from 100% pure dark chocolate (no sweetners of any kind…very bitter) to sweeten chocolate with cinnamon, perperoncino, lemon, salt, and bits of orange.  Afterwards, we were directed toward the factory and given a demonstration of how the chocolate is made.  In the picture you see what looks like small licorice-like orange pieces, which they either insert into the chocolate or form into small orange rings.  As you can see, we had to dress in white smocks from head to toe in order to enter the factory.  I felt like Mike-TV on Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory! 

In the end the chocolate got the best of me and I ordered several bars of the cinnamon chocolate.  Unbelievably good!  Now that we were all in choco-comma, we waddled our way back onto the bus and headed back to our hotel in Taormina for dinner (really??) and then some much-needed rest!

Ragusa (February 21)

It was a beautiful day in Ragusa, a small town in the southern part of Sicily, probably the nicest day we’ve had on the trip.  After debarking the bus and hiking up a small hill, we arrived at La Piazza San Giorgio.  We met up with our two tour guides, Barbara and Francesca.  The kids were divided up into two groups and each group had their own guide. Ours was Francesca, a very energetic woman, and her bright yellow jacket only accentuated this point.

My first observation of the town was the absence of people.  I noticed this same phenomenon in Taormina the day before.  So where are all the people?  Are they on holiday? Have we walked into some ghost town that has been perfectly preserved?  As Jerry Seinfeld would say, “what’s the deal?”

As one of the SYA Italian teachers said in jest, “Ragusa….where the men are aristocratically sublime while the women are home baking and the children are at school.”  In Ragusa’s defense, it’s not a huge tourist attraction and it was a Friday morning, not a point in the week where there would be a lot of people milling about in the streets.  That said, Ragusa was one of the cleanest towns I’ve seen in Italy.

Here are some facts about Ragusa. It has two patron saints, San Giuseppe and San Giorgio.  The whole town was flattened by an earthquake in 1693.  The only surviving piece of the old town was the portal to the church of San Giuseppi (see left).  As a result the entire city was rebuilt and moved to its current location.  All of the major fortresses were built during the Barroque period.  The exterior of the duomo of San Giorgio (see left)  is a good illustration of this style architecture.  While Mount Etna is visible from Ragusa, this town actually sits on the edge of another mountain range called Iblea.  Ragusa is also credited for inventing ravioli and is also well known for their gnocci.

Francesca, our guide, was great.  Aside from maintaining an authentic smile on her face the whole time, she was extremely knowledgeable about the area and she was very patient with our kids throughout.  One of her many teachable moments was to distinguish for the kids the difference between a chiesa and a duomo.  While any town in Italy has numerous churches, there is usually only one duomo.  I say “usually” because Ragusa actually has two duomos.  The duomo of a town is considered the main church.  A duomo can be a cathedral if there is a sitting bishop of the town.  This picture is the interior of one of the Duomos, San Giorgio, named after Giorgio, the Roman warrior of his time.  The second picture shows one of The Stations of the Cross inside San Giorgio, probably one of the most beautiful sets of The Stations I’ve seen in Italy.  The third picture (below) shows the altar of San Giorgio.

The other duomo, San Giuseppi (pictured at the right, was not opened however Francesca explained the interesting markings just to the right of the entryway.  The markings illustrate an Islamic way of telling time, indicating the once Islamic influence within the region.  If you look blown-up picture below, there is a nail through the 24-hour line.  The 24-hour line indicates sunset.  Given the placement on the sun, it casts a shadow of the nail on the wall, which intersects the other hour lines from hour 18 through 24.  The length of the line from the 24-hour line indicates the amount of sunlight left in the day.  In the picture below, the shadow of the nail is touching the 20-hour line, which would mean that sunset will occur in approximately four hours from the current time.  I’m not sure of the accuracy, given that this picture was taken at around 1 in the afternoon, but the concept still is pretty interesting!